Slow Burn
by mysticxf
Summary: Why exactly do the others want Jack and Kate and what are the consequences?


Lost and its characters belong to JJ Abrams, Bad Robot and the Others. I'm playing with them for fun because those bastards keeeel me with their cliffhanger. Written in response to my brain, some theories, and someone saying "I wanna see Kate go Dark Phoenix on their asses" (or something to that effect.). Why exactly do the others want Jack and Kate and what are the consequences?

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Lost – Slow Burn  
By Mystic  
June 6th 2006

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They pulled her away from him quickly, almost immediately and she screamed, hearing him and Sawyer shout her name as they took her down a long hallway. Henry urged her to stay calm while Tom made a joke. Kate didn't even catch the joke, but she saw Klugh smack him in the chest and call him a pervert. That much she caught. Kate struggled when someone pushed her forward. She shouted that she couldn't leave him.

Someone put a needle in her neck and she heard Alex give a shout of surprise. "Why did you have to do that!" The girl said before moving closer to Kate to balance her body. "She would have…" her voice faded out and Kate closed her eyes. The next voice she heard was Henry's, muffled. "…get it from him?" Her head felt dizzy and her muscles felt numb, and she thought about Jack. "Their genetics…" came Tom's voice. It sounded somewhat excited. She couldn't tell. She felt her lips form Jack's name, but she didn't hear it. When she woke again, she brought a hand down quickly to a spot on her abdomen that felt sore.

"Kate!" He shouted, his hands touching her hands, her face, her neck. She smiled, thinking everything was ok. Everything had to be ok, but her head felt woozy and something about her body felt… off.

"Genetics," she muttered. "Something about our genetics."

They came back for her when she started to show. When they realized what had happened.

He watched her grow when they passed in the hall. Her to one exam room and him to another. He was sure that's where it had started, an injection in an exam room, a few hours sleep, and that bump forming at her belly just before they separated them again. Her knuckles brushed his arm and he lowered his eyes to the ground, resigned to let them run the tests on him. They promised him if he didn't fight, they wouldn't hurt her, wouldn't hurt their baby.

She called his name, her voice pained as she waited for him to look at her, but he refused. Something in his mind hurt, throbbed, and he knew it was her, but he wouldn't let her in. He was sure that's what they wanted. Some latent ability they both had but hadn't accepted. He heard her call him on the dock clearly, her voice somewhere at the center of his mind, calling him, asking him to look at her and when he did, he gave her a nod, letting her know he was there for her if she'd be there for him.

Jack heard her struggle, heard her put a fist in someone's face and Tom shouted, "Do that again and we'll kill him!" He heard her sob, heard her feet continue down the hall and it was only then he understood they were using him to keep her in check too.

"When did you first know you could…" Henry started to ask her. She raised her eyes to him, her hand stroking her stomach slowly, and he stopped his own question, his hand coming up to touch his forehead as he winced. "Imagine what you could do if you tried," he sighed.

Kate didn't respond. She looked down at her stomach, at the white blouse they'd given her. She watched the way it moved up and down with each breath she took. Something inside her was moving. She felt a wave of nausea come over her and she pressed her lips together.

"I know what you can do," Henry stated suddenly, pointedly, and he smacked a newspaper clipping down in front of her. On it was a picture of her childhood home, what was left of it after it exploded. Kate pushed the paper away, pushed the image of Wayne smiling with her mother from some store photo they took after they got married away. "I bet you didn't even give it a second thought, did you."

"I didn't do it."

Henry walked a circle around her. "Not with your hands, you didn't." He chuckled to himself. "I just want you to tap back into that for me. Can you try to tap back into that?"

Kate shook her head, but as she did, the table in front of her shook.

They were allowed five minutes. The door shut behind her and she stood with her hands on her stomach and her eyes on him and she was crying, her head starting to shake from side to side, not wanting to believe any of it was real. So he moved closer, he touched her cheek; wiped her tears, and he told her he was there. He wondered what they'd been doing to her. She held onto his shirt, rubbing the material between her fingers, her eyes lowering to the motion.

Jack put his hands at her sides, his palms resting on the bulge between them, feeling something inside thumping and she looked at him then, red-eyed and scared. "I can't…" she started, her hands grabbing hold of his arms. "I can't…" she said again, her head shaking, her hair falling forward, a curtain of waves hiding her face from him. This place was making her crazy. He knew it, he'd heard it before, they'd been standing exactly the same then, but in the jungle.

When she kissed him. When she let that wall crumble down for a minute and let him in, held him tight. Jack watched her body, the way it seemed to slump in ways it never had before. Like she'd given up on life and he felt his heart constrict painfully for her. This was all his fault. He shouldn't have let her come. Should have known, somehow, that she was who they wanted, that this was what they wanted.

He moved her hair back, holding her face so she could look at him. "I'm right here," he told her gently. "Right here." He didn't know what else to say. He knew she wanted him to tell her it would be ok. She wanted him to tell her he had a plan. She wanted him to rescue her. Jack knew he couldn't. So he held her, feeling their child between them, so alive it hurt. He brushed her cheek, kissed her lips, feeling her sigh into his mouth as she closed her eyes and kissed him back.

They came to get her exactly five minutes after she'd entered and she held his hand, refused to let go until Tom appeared and said her name. That was all he had to say and her hand released, snapping away so quick Jack couldn't have caught her if he wanted. He moved towards the door as they left, his eyes peering out a small window at the top to see her walking down the hall, a hand coming to rest at the small of her back to support herself.

She never turned around.

Kate thought she knew pain. She watched Henry duck his head between her legs, his hands snaking up under her gown to press against her stomach and she shouted at him, watching him jump up away from her, his nose bleeding freely. "Get away!" She shouted, feeling heat course through her lower body.

She felt a pair of gentle hands on her arm and she looked up to see Alex standing next to her, concerned. She felt Kate's forehead, nodded at Klugh, who came with a wet towel to dab at the sweat there. "I'm sorry about all of this," was all Alex told her before touching her knee and moving around to sit on the stool just under her feet. "You have to push him out now," the girl instructed calmly.

Shaking her head, Kate thought of Jack, sitting in that room, no clue of what was going on. She felt Alex's fingers touch her left ankle lightly. "Kate, please. Please push."

Kate opened her eyes, not knowing she'd shut them, and she looked down at the large green eyes that waited, scared. If she got out, she told the girl in that way Henry wanted, she was going to take her. Save her.

He felt when she was coming now. They wouldn't let her come in, but she could approach the door. Let her communicate with him through it. Jack wasn't sure whether it was a good gesture to her or to him. He got up and walked towards the window, watching her swing the infant into the air as she walked down the hall, her hands leaving his sides for only a split second before catching him and bringing him down to nuzzle his stomach. Jack often imagined how he'd smell. That baby smell.

He'd never touched him. Henry had tapped on the glass window one day and announced that she'd delivered a boy. A healthy eight pound, four ounce, twenty three inch long boy. And she named him Jack. She hugged him gently, her hair pulled away from her face so he couldn't grab hold with his chubby fists and when she spotted him, she frowned. Jack knew how he must have looked. Desperate. He held the edges of the window, had his forehead pressed against the cold glass trying to get a better look at his son.

"Hey," she said to him simply, turning the boy against her chest so he could see him. Little Jack clapped his hands, recognized his father and lurched forward towards him before Kate balanced him with a strong hand against his chest. He hit the glass with his small palm and Jack laughed. He'd stopped crying when she told him she wouldn't bring him anymore if he did. So he made faces at the boy who let his head fall back against his mother's chest as he gurgled happily.

Jack's eyes shifted, seeing Henry coming down the hallway, his eyes on Kate and he pointed. "What's he want?"

Kate turned slightly and when she brought her face back, it was flustered. "They keep testing him," she told him. "They still test me."

She named him Jack so she could say his name.

Jack, no. Jack, stop that. Jack, come here. Jack, I love you.

They had their own room. Kate watched Jack crawl around on the ground while she listened to Alex talk to her about how on one side of the island there were fruits that were so sweet you could only have one bite. Alex talked to her a lot. In some way having her there made her more comfortable. Made her feel like she maybe had a friend there. Jack babbled to himself and picked up a round red ball and tossed it, then crawled after it as it rolled across the room.

"Your head hurts, doesn't it?" Alex asked suddenly.

Kate jerked up, looking at the intensity in the other woman's eyes. "What doesn't hurt," Kate responded despondently. She touched her temples lightly and nodded. "My head hurts."

"I keep telling Henry not to try so hard." Alex sighed. "We have all the time in the world, right?"

Kate cried. All the time in the world was too much time. "I just want Jack," she allowed herself to say. She'd said it to Henry too many times to count, but the man knew threatening his life kept her from doing anything stupid. So she played along with his card games and his questions and his monitors, she watched as her son was returned to her every evening clutching her body with a fear she couldn't understand.

She felt Alex put a hand on her shoulder and Kate lifted her head, moving closer to the woman who hugged her tightly, honestly. The red ball bounced off her leg and then she felt small hands grab her pants, saw the boy pull himself up to stand next to her and cry for her, one arm raised towards her, the other not releasing its grip on her. Kate pulled him into her lap and wiped his tears before her own and she looked at Alex.

"You have to be stronger for them," the girl told her with a nod of her head. And Kate understood what she really meant.

He ran now. Fast. And she had trouble keeping up. The small boy would wave a hand, shout "Hey daddy!" and keep going, a devilish smile on his thin lips. That face where he didn't know where he ended and Kate began raced by several times a day. He had bony knees and big feet and floppy hair. But he had her eyes. Bold and green with that hint of sadness in them always. Jack tapped the glass, that small movement catching Kate's attention and she turned, out of breath towards him.

Jack shook his head at her when she started to invade his thoughts. The more they tested her, the easier it was for her. He wondered if she'd known all along. Kate shook her head at him and he shouted at her angrily.

"I'm sorry, Jack!" She shouted back. "I'm doing the best I can here."

"I can see that," he waved an arm at her, dismissing her and she scowled.

"You think this is EASY for me!" Kate slammed the door with her hand so he'd look up at her again. "They killed Sawyer because of me, they keep you in here because of me. Everyone is in constant danger because of me!"

Jack watched her inhale deeply and exhale, her head turning away from the door so he couldn't see how much it hurt her to speak to him. She walked away slowly and he rushed to the window, his mind trying as hard as it could. He'd never tried. They'd never wanted him to. His eyes squeezed shut; he concentrated on her.

But it was her voice that reached him.

Stop trying, Jack.

Kate watched her son sleep. He lay on his side against the wall and his mouth was open, drool soaking a small pillow Klugh gave him on his last birthday. It was such a contrast from the ball of energy that raced down the halls and climbed up Tom's back, or did circles around Henry while he looked annoyed at the small child. She traced his jaw line with her finger and planted a kiss in his hair. He had Jack's hair, soft and dark and thin. She imagined what Jack might have looked like as a child.

The boy sighed and closed his mouth, then wiped at it with his hand, his eyes opening slowly as he smiled up at her. "Is it morning?" he asked, his voice cracking with sleep. Shaking her head, she told him it wasn't and he frowned. "You don't talk anymore, mommy," he lamented, his foot giving her a shove in frustration.

"Sorry, baby," she whispered, her own throat dry.

"It's time to go home," he muttered, sitting up and leaning against the wall.

Kate smoothed down his hair and watched him, confused. "What do you mean?"

"If we don't leave now, they'll hurt me," he told her calmly.

Shaking her head, Kate asked, "How do you know that?" She paused, then added, "They wouldn't hurt you, Jack."

He nodded his head. "You have to do it, mommy. That thing you think of."

Flopping back down onto the pillow, Jack drifted off to sleep and Kate straightened. How did he know what she thought of? It made her heart hammer in her chest because she knew exactly how he knew. He saw it. Not because she wanted him to, but because he could.

There was something of a panic outside and he rolled over on his small bed slowly, watching the figures rushing past the door while the lights flickered. There was a fire outside. His eyebrows came together in confusion and he watched the doorknob turn slowly. Jack sat up, then stood, waiting for the door to open. Something sparked, the sound scaring him, and he raised a hand up to shield his face when the door suddenly swung wide and hit the wall. He heard the metal crash into the concrete and he felt his pulse starting to race.

But what greeted him wasn't Tom or Henry, as he expected, but a five year old boy who looked up at him from the doorway with a surprised expression on his face. "You're tall," he managed, something comical in his tone as he rushed towards him.

Jack felt numb, watching the bony little boy latch onto his midsection and bury his face in his thigh. He was warm. Jack had forgotten what the warmth of another person felt like. Putting his hands down on the boy's back, he felt himself having difficulty breathing. Something choked him as he pulled the small child back away from him. He bent down, his hands traveling from the boy's shoulders to his elbows and then to his hands. Little Jack held his fingers tightly and he gave him a smile, a true smile before Jack picked him up off the ground and looked to the woman who was standing at the door now.

She sobbed, her hand covering her mouth before running into him. She held him tightly, her forehead pressed into his chest and he could feel her breathing roughly against him.

"Kate, what did you do?" He asked gently, waiting for her to raise her eyes to him.

"What they wanted her to," Alex responded from the doorway. "We should go, now." The girl looked at each of them and then turned and waited for them to follow.

"What did you do?" Jack asked again softly as they approached the doorway.

She refused to answer.

Everything around them was on fire, a fire she could somehow control – shift, move, erase. Kate closed her eyes when they passed what was left of Henry, of Klugh, of Tom. She glanced up at Jack who hid his son's head against his shoulder. He watched the flames spark up here and there and eventually, he glanced down at her and she nodded.

This is what I did.

For us.

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Finis 


End file.
